So many mistakes have been made, and so many lessons have been learned by other designers. If you don’t play their games, you’re going to waste time making all those mistakes again for yourself.
— Adam Porter
Scoring is what incentivises different behaviours. So, to a large extent, your scoring system IS your game. A good scoring system can provide a higher skill ceiling, differentiation of skill, reward interesting/fun play, tension of risk/reward, and real meaningful choices.
— Bez